


remembering won't help us forget

by scriptmanip



Series: Resting on Your Laurels [2]
Category: Skins (UK)
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2013-08-09
Updated: 2013-08-09
Packaged: 2017-12-22 13:17:57
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Chapters: 1
Words: 13,863
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/913649
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/scriptmanip/pseuds/scriptmanip
Summary: <blockquote class="userstuff">
              <p>There are moments, you think, where nothing else matters but the colour of her eyes when she’s determined. When she’s happy. When she looks at you and you have to believe that she’ll never look at anyone else this way, ever again.</p>
            </blockquote>





	remembering won't help us forget

_So I think it’s best we both forget before we dwell on it_

_The way you held me so tight all through the night, til it was near morning_

* * *

  
_Emily, some time ago_

“I don’t know what to tell you – she saw the acceptance letter and proceeded to throw money at me like a fucking lunatic.”

Naomi’s stood in the middle of the bedroom – _her_ bedroom, technically, though your things can be found on every surface; your imprint on the space unmistakable – with her hands on her hips. She’s so tall and affronting and beautiful, in a skirt that doesn’t cover her kneecaps, making it hard to remember your side of the argument when looking at her head-on.

“Yes, well, I’m not sure _this_ is what she had in mind,” you finally manage, thrusting the airline tickets in her direction for emphasis.

You’re sat on the bed, leant up against its wall of pillows she insists on having, even though most nights she’ll fall asleep without _any_ of them. Just laid flat against the mattress, like an infant with disproportionately long legs.

“Of fucking _course_ it is – have you met my mum?” Naomi’s flopped down onto the bed beside you and you bounce just once against the mattress from the impact. “She _lives_ for this kind of shit. Sometimes I think she loves travel even more than she loves me.”

“Naomi …”

“No, look – I’ve aced my A-levels, been accepted to university, and what I want as reward for my studious achievements is to take my girlfriend to the Caribbean. Alright?”

There are moments, you think, where nothing else matters but the colour of her eyes when she’s determined. When she’s happy. When she looks at you and you have to believe that she’ll never look at anyone else this way, ever again.

“ _Emily_ ,” she whinges.

“We don’t even speak Spanish.” It’s such a thin argument, but you’re grasping at straws because it’s still a lot of money for her to have spent on a trip that neither of you can really afford.

“ _Bollocks_ – it’s been horribly Americanised anyway.” She hooks just one finger into your trousers and pulls so that you have to roll onto your side, facing her. “Besides, you and me, Fitch, we can be quite resourceful, yeah?”

The way you stop fighting against the smile crawling across your lips and look up to find her wide-eyed and grinning like an idiot, is as much a concession as anything.

“After this summer, you know,” she starts more quietly, looking down to where her hand is barely tucked beneath your shirt. Her thumb still softly moving against your hipbone.

“No,” you say with a determination you’ve learnt to be quite effective where Naomi is concerned. “We’re not talking about it, okay? We promised.” Your head drops as you shake it slowly. “I can’t – I can’t even _think_ about not being with you.”

University and post-college plans had mostly been a black hole of uncertainty – first with Katie, knowing your marks were never really very aligned; then with Naomi, knowing that your decision on where to go would always, in part, be linked to her. And now, with Naomi off to London at the end of summer, the time to make your own decisions on university only seems more imminent. And you’re not ready – you’re just not ready for any of it. So the tactic of avoidance, you’ve more than mastered.

She’s looking at you when you’ve raised your head again, smiling in a way that you will never, fully be able to take in all at once. And so you’ve pinched together your lips and look away when she says quietly, leant in towards your ear, “Then let me take you on holiday.”

**

She gets too much sun the first day and spends the next two days crying about the straps on her bra until you remind her she could just opt out of wearing one because, chances are, her breasts will never again be as perky as they are at eighteen.

“Excuse me but, are you somehow implying that my tits will not always look as fucking fantastic as they do at this moment?”

She’s stood in front of you, in nothing but bright blue knickers, while you rub the after-sun on her back and shoulders, but you pause, just long enough to catch her eye in the mirror’s reflection, only to roll your own at her.

“I will find your tits to be _fucking fantastic_ , at any age,” you say, lightly kissing her shoulder cap and watching her face relax before turning away to retrieve your clothes off the bed.

 She catches you, just by the wrist, and then turns towards you as you laugh and stumble forward. When your tongue touches your lips in anticipation of the kiss, you taste coconuts.

“Promise?” You feel the word like a breath against your lips, her own just hovering there.

You’re not at liberty to make promises to one another. Not even small, insignificant ones. Not at your age and definitely not when your lives, at the moment, feel so capricious. A single word could tip the balances, and you’d only be able to watch helplessly as it all came tumbling down. But then, you’ve never shied away from this, from her. You’ve never held back in saying the things that weigh the most. And so you smile against her mouth, kissing her as you nod, until her hands find their way into your hair, and you can feel her skin pressing into you. Until the warmth of it covers you completely.

Everything in the city feels smaller, more contained, the way the buildings are all squat and pushed together and the streets narrow. You take a day trip to one of the surrounding islands and spend the entire length of the ferry ride pressed against the ship’s white railings, Naomi wrapped around you from behind. It’s an hour that feels more like time standing still. You close your eyes to the sea breeze, to the early morning sun, to the sensation of Naomi pressed up against you, her hair whipping around your faces like unruly rays of light. When she prompts you with a gentle nudge of her nose against your cheek, you turn and kiss her, tasting salt from the ocean’s spray.

You spend long hours in the hotel between your time in the sun and nightfall. And it’s this kind of dodgy room with tacky bed linens and a squeaky mattress, but Naomi swears she can hear the tide coming in at night with the windows open. So you tell her it’s lovely, that you can’t imagine a better place to spend your holiday. And when a stillness falls over the room at night, you strain to hear the waves crash from several blocks away.

It’s just this absolute free-fall of sex and abandon like you’ve never before had. Like you’ve never before imagined. Being with Naomi started out like having your eyes blindfolded, being spun about, then told to walk a straight line. But over time, things settled and calmed and _normalised_. It’s not that being with her is ever dull, but it’s far more manageable now than it had been at the beginning.

Even still, there have always been restrictions. There’s always Katie, bartering for your time; there’s always been coursework; there’s always been curfews, and family dinners, and your _mum_. But there’s never been this – which is time, uninterrupted. Which is Naomi giggling in the shower, as you try to scrub the sand off each other’s stomachs. Or her head in your lap, breaths heavy and eyes closed, while you read old favourites: Harper Lee and Fitzgerald and James Baldwin. And it’s orgasms as loud as you please as often as you like without worry of meeting Gina’s eye at the breakfast table. Which is here on an island where you don’t speak the language and it doesn’t even matter. Which is being alone with the girl that you’ve craved for so long, it’s hard to remember a time when you didn’t love her or want her as much as you do.

“You’re very drunk,” you tell her, rather affectionately, once you’ve paid the tab and begin walking, unsteadily, down cobblestone.

“Sangria appears to be my Achilles heel then,” she nearly slurs, one arm wrapped around your waist for support. And it’s not even accurate, her admission, because you know at least a handful of other intoxicants that lend the same results.

You’d sat at an outside café right in the heart of the city, just off the square. Drank pitchers of sangria, ate fried plantains and mango chutney. Talked and laughed and _blushed_ when Naomi’s fingers trailed up your leg from beneath the table, shaded by large red-and-white umbrellas.

The sun continues to set and the buildings’ brilliant colours dim with each passing minute until everything is muted – the violets, the greens, the yellows and reds – except for the music, its quick beats and thrumming guitars so alluring that Naomi’s vanishing inhibitions can’t resist. So she’s pulled you along, threaded you through the crowded streets until you’re twirling towards her, laughing, giving in to the playfulness in her smile, to the music, to her. To _everything_.  

“Take me dancing,” she says against your ear, and it’s only above a whisper to account for the music thumping into the streets.

You pull her into an alley and kiss her against a wall – any wall, the _closest_ wall – that’s smooth and cool and so very _Latin_ by way of its colour and texture. But it’s not hungry or urgent, this kiss. She just pulls you in by your waist, tilts her head down to reach you so easily. And it suddenly hits you just how instinctual you’ve both become. How every push against her is a pull on you. How every move is reactionary, synced and lovely. Everything stretches on, the feel of her hands sliding up your sides and onto your back as you lean into her. The warmth of the night air, and how it feels cooler in contrast to her mouth against yours. It's not until some loud and excitable Spanish echoes into the alley that you pull back, a blush rapidly colouring your face when you look to see three Puerto Rican boys smiling and applauding like it’s a bloody football match.

“Come on – let’s get out of here.” You pull Naomi along, out of the alley and past your audience, even as she continues to drunkenly laugh and shout _‘Gracias! Gracias!’_ over her shoulder when the boys refuse to stop cheering.

It’s a beautiful thing, Naomi letting go. It’d been mesmerising from the very start – back at college, back even before that – watching her give way, a little at a time. You’ve always been paying attention, always kept your eye on her to catch glimpses of these subtle changes. Always measured the distance she kept, until there was no space between you at all.

And now, watching her with your back leant up against the bar counter, you’re practically, fucking hypnotised.

She moves with abandon – in and out of time with the music – and it doesn’t even matter, for how happy she looks. She’s a rather hot commodity, you think, in that nearly everyone on the dance floor has been on rotation to move with her. _Must be the blonde hair_ , you muse. In a place filled with dark features and gorgeous shades of brown and olive skin, Naomi’s shock-blonde hair and light eyes create quite the contrast.

‘ _Perpetrators will always seek out the blondes as prey when taking hostages_ ,’ Jenna had warned. It’d been part of her warm, farewell speech to you before catching your flight out of Bristol. You laugh at the memory of it – of your mum, rigid and wary, as she’d let you off at the kerb for departures. Your poor mum, who’d likely never change. Who'd never known how to say anything remotely nurturing without coming off like a total cunt. 

You’ve got two beer bottles hooked between your fingers as you push off the counter and make your way back towards her, weaving through the drunk dancers and catching wafts of cologne and sweat and cheap beer. She opens her eyes slowly when you’ve pressed one of the cold bottles, beaded with perspiration, against her bare arm. And then everyone just shifts away as she pulls you closer, one hand at the back of your neck. And then everything starts to fall away – the club, the band, the sweat along your brow and upper lip.

You close your eyes. You remember the way she says, ‘ _Let’s stay here forever_ ’ and nothing else.

“Hey.” Her voice sounds distinctly closer, and you blink.

Naomi’s stood in front of you, her hair pulled back and long – a very natural shade of auburn. Something creases her brow when she looks down where you’re sat at a table and says, “Everything alright? You look a bit odd. Like you’ve just remembered you left the kettle on or something.”

You can’t answer her because your mouth’s gone horribly dry, and so she takes a seat across from you while you try to swallow. You just look at her for the longest second – waiting for the memory of her, that girl from another life, to fade away completely, before saying, “Yeah, something like that.”

“Alright, well, you’re not going to burn anything down, are you?”

She’ll not ever be gone completely, you think. Because that girl is still there, swirled in the colour of her eyes and hidden behind the curve of her smirk. So you resign yourself to it, to being confronted with the memory of her, and try for a smile. “No. No, I don’t think so.”

**

_Naomi, presently_

You arrive to the coffee shop a bit late, and find Emily already sat at a table near the windows. You spot her right away, even without her beacon of red hair to guide you. It was what you attributed as the reason you could always seek her out so easily; but then, maybe that was never it at all.

She looks a bit lost, the way her eyes can’t seem to focus even though she’s looking right at you. Though, by the time you’ve sat across from her, she seems to have shaken that faraway gaze entirely.

“How are things?” she asks you, and suddenly everything once written across her face has righted itself.

“You’ve stolen my line,” you smile, settling into your seat and absently looking about the shop.

“The opening is soon, isn’t it?”

“Too soon,” you sigh. “But, it’s going well – I’m quite ready to finish the intricate bits and see the finished product, you know? But that’s just me – never really been all that patient. But then, I suppose you already knew that.”

When she smiles, it’s not completely genuine. And it’s not something Emily generally does: hold back. But then, you’ve created all these assumptions about her based on someone you knew a hundred years ago. That she’s still as open and honest as she was at twenty, being just one. So you make a note to stop referencing a life long since gone, because there’s a good chance that the girl with which you shared it, is gone as well.

“I’ve got tickets,” you say by way of distraction, “for you and Rose. For the opening, I mean.”

“Oh. You do?” Her surprise anyway, sounds authentic.

“Yeah, of course – I’ll drop them by tomorrow. Or, you could come by the venue.”

“Naomi that’s –“ she doesn’t finish her thought [again], just keep shaking her head while casting her eyes to the table and pinching her lip between her teeth. And you’ve got your mouth pressed tightly together to stop from berating her about this habit she’s formed of leaving things unfinished. Of leaving so much unsaid. “Thank you,” is what she says instead.

“It’s no problem. Rose had mentioned it at dinner, and it’s not like I’ve got loads of friends here to take advantage of my free tickets.”

“Oh, well, when you put it that way, I’m terribly flattered.” It’s sparked back into her eyes again, the way they look deeper and wider when she’s engaged in light banter. And you feel some reassurance that, even after all this time, you’ve not got her pegged completely wrong.

“So, motherhood going alright for you?” You look up at her tentatively, folding your hands along the table top to keep from chipping away at your nail varnish.

“It’s … an experience.” She’s smiling, but Emily’s eyes give her away. Every time.

“What is it?” You swallow hard, concentrate on taking steady breaths because you’d very much like to handle this conversation – whatever it is – like a calm and rational human being.

“It’s nothing.” She shrugs, and then does start picking at her own nails.

“Emily.” She doesn’t look at you, which has always been a sure sign that something too large is crowding her head and she’s not yet worked out how to express it. “Come on,” you prod, your voice so calmed and quiet you hardly recognise it as your own. “You’re the one who phoned me, remember?”

“Rose has just been … off. A bit.”

Not that you’d had any expectations, really, on what this conversation might entail. Not that you’d had even a bastard’s clue on why she’d asked to see you. And you’ve hardly thought of anything else since the call – not that it’s done you much good since you’re still sat here now, completely unprepared on how to respond.

“Off?”

“Yeah. It’s been nothing major, just small things really. But, it’s the way she is with Lewis and even with me. Sort of detached, and I don't know. It just feels like things are _off_.”

Emily’s not really giving you much to go on. But, regardless, you know fuck-all about pregnancy and hormones and babies, in general, so you panic only slightly that _this_ is why Emily called you. Because, honestly, doesn’t she have Katie for this sort of thing? Or her mum? Or a dozen other friends in her life, at least some of which, you assume, have procreated. Doesn’t she have _anyone_ besides you, who’s only just resurfaced? Who’s never known what to make of family and all its intricacies. Certainly not the way it’s always made sense to Emily.

She sniffles quietly, runs the tips of her fingers under her eyes, one and then the next, and keeps them cast down like she’s hoping you won’t notice. You take a deep breath then, erasing every frayed and panicked nerve in your body. Because it’s suddenly so obvious that the thing you do know, the thing you’ve _always_ known, is how to comfort Emily. You wonder if she knows that too. You wonder if it’s the whole reason she’s asked to see you. You wonder if she also knows just how dangerous a dynamic this could be.

“Are you getting much sleep?”

Her laugh is rough, the way it just sort of chokes out and lands on the table. But she finally meets your eye, as if to say, _‘Do you really expect me to answer that?’_

So you try again, the words forming and spilling out just as Emily’s looked away. “Remember that weekend after your exams when you took the train after staying up all night studying?” Her eyes are on you in an instant then, surprised maybe that you’ve brought it up. Surprised maybe that you remember it at all. Your breathing stops, momentarily, because you’ve also sort of surprised yourself. “When you got in, you were _convinced_ I wasn’t happy to see you. You were absolutely _certain_ I had no interest in you being there – raged in my flat like a fucking madwoman for hours. And I ended up paying for the dent in the wall where you threw my textbook, thank you so kindly.”

“One of our finest rows,” she smiles proudly. Her fingers have stilled against the table, flecks of blue varnish scattered around them.

“Mmm,” you hum, smiling in return.

“Sorry – about the wall.”

“The sodding wall isn’t the point, Emily,” you say with an exasperated headshake. “You’re exhausted, yeah? And no doubt Rose is as well – which is making your perspective on things seem far more grim than I’m sure they really are. A lack of sleep and you go a bit mental, right?”

She nods, like she believes you. Like she _wants_ to believe you, at the very least. You can’t shake the feeling that there’s more she’s not saying, but it’s been too long. And you still can’t ask for more than what she’s willing to give.

“You’re right – I’ve overreacted, I’m sure. And, really, Lewis is just – he’s just fucking wonderful.”

“I’m sure Rose would agree.”

“Right.” And then with a bit more conviction, “Yes, of course she does. I’m sorry – “ she struggles, starts again with her nails until your hand reaches across the small gap between you on the table, and you touch just the tips of your fingers to hers. They still immediately, and Emily watches them as she continues. “I’m sorry for making things seem worse than they are, and blowing things out of proportion, and –“

“For the wall?”

You’ve arched an eyebrow and regard her warmly when she meets your eye. A touch of pink colours the top of her ear – you can see just the one where its peeked out from behind her hair. And you think, maybe it's okay to remember old times. Maybe it's okay to acknowledge some of the life you've outgrown. Maybe it's not so bad if it results in Emily's timid smile and embarrassed flush.

“Yeah, that too,” she says, then moves her hands to her lap, as if she’s just realised they’d been touching yours in the first place. “I’m sorry, too, for asking you to come here. For this. I'm sure it's not anything you're interested in hearing.”

“It’s okay,” you tell her, detecting a sudden waiver in your own voice.

When Emily looks up, you realise why you feel so unsteady. “Is it?”

Your face is flushed, you know it by the sudden heat in your neck and ear lobes. “I don’t know, actually." Emily looks back up and you laugh nervously. "But, I’m here now, and I think we’ve managed to pull you off a ledge, so – no harm done?”

Emily attempts a smile as she swallows and ends up looking half her age. “Right.”

The sounds of the shop fill in the gaps of silence between you: the hiss of a cappuccino maker, the grinding of coffee beans, random bits of conversation that float past you. You don’t mind the silences, and you quite like just sitting here with her. Still, a question nags that you think might be alright to ask.

“Can I ask you something?”

She looks warily at you before slowly allowing. “Sure.”

“Has your sister not come round at all since Lewis was born? It’s not been more than a few weeks, I guess, but it’s just you’ve not mentioned her. And I’m a bit surprised she’s not here.”

Emily looks at you curiously, a smile curling to her lips and the worry that once creased her features is gone completely.

“What is it?” you ask, fiddling the gold ring on your middle finger.

“I just don’t think I’ll ever get used to you asking after Katie is all.”

“It’s not like we _never_ got on – we found our truce,” you argue, but Emily’s arched eyebrow prompts you to amend, “ _Eventually_.” And then she laughs, all the dark clouds gone and replaced with the pleasant sound of it. “So, go on then,” you prompt her. “Where is she hiding herself these days?”

Emily leans back into her chair with another laugh, pushes both hands through her hair, and you have to strain to keep your eyes from drifting towards her neck and shoulders, bared entirely if not for her simple, grey vest top.

“How much time have you got?”

You exhale, and for once, feel it relax you. “I have some.”

She smiles and says, “Good.” Then tells you to buy her a coffee. And so you do.

You’re sharing things you shouldn’t, like looks and smiles and coffees and time. Time that doesn’t belong to you, or to her. There are other people to contend for it, others that have taken your place. But when you return to the table, slide a cappuccino in front of her and watch her face light up as you take your seat, it doesn’t feel wrong. It feels like Emily is giving you something. And it feels, as it always has, like something you’re meant to have.

**

On the night of the opening you get incredibly smashed and end up sleeping with Effy.

Or, well, _on_ Effy anyway.

You’d drank until dawn, spent a great deal of time seriously contemplating doing leg races down the Millennium Bridge, then passed out somewhere between a cab ride and Effy’s lush, sixteenth-story loft. Which is when you come to, your head propped on her rail-thin stomach and your bodies, still in lavish party dresses, splayed out across her massive bed.

Effy doesn’t stir when you lift your head, just continues to lie flat and so unnervingly still that your senses – still fucking blurred to hell from what you expect will be a massive hangover – start to panic. And you move your ear quickly towards her mouth, waiting to either hear or _feel_ her breathe.

“Naomi.”

You leap back with such force, a sharp pain rockets through your skull, forcing your eyes to shut tightly, and one hand clutches at the bed covers while the other to your head.

“ _Christ_ , you fucking scared me.”

“Me? You’re the one fucking hovering over me like a concerned nurse.”

“My apologies,” you drone, lying back against the bed, opposite her so that your head is near her ankles. “I thought you’d passed on.”

“ _Passed on_? From chardonnay and jaeger bombs? Fucking hell, Naomi, you really haven’t a clue about the on goings of my adolescence, do you?” Effy’s voice sounds hoarse and her laughter just barely scratches out, even as she reaches over to grab a fag from her pack on the nightstand.

“I feel like shit,” you groan. “No, like worse than shit – what’s worse than shit?”

Effy doesn’t miss a beat, she never did. “Seeing Emily in an incredibly sexy, black cocktail dress with a gorgeous blonde on her arm that isn’t you?”

You don’t even think you can manage a retort, not a good one anyway. Still, it feels less like utter defeat when you’ve propped up on both elbows and scowl at her, “Don’t fucking remind me. And give me one of those, will you?”

Stunning isn’t even the right word, inadequate in what it fails to capture. And _sexy_ , while maybe a bit more apt, implies far too much. There aren’t yet, in fact, appropriately descriptive adjectives within the English language to account for how Emily had looked at the opening. Her hair swept up, exposing her neck and shoulders. Her eyes, dark and shining in open admiration – the colour of them so deep and inviting, you’d not dared look into them for more than a few seconds at a time. And the dress – short and black, at the same time modest and alluring – an absolute vision of effortless seduction. You’d seen them enter – her and Rosalind – then proceeded to clock her at every exhibit. Always watching, always the wandering eye, while holding court with the artists’ admirers, the press, the London elite. You kept watch, even as they held each other close. Even as Rose cradled Emily’s face in her hand and kissed her softly in front of your favourite piece from the installation. Emily had found you some time later, at the bar, when Effy had been lured away by a pack of charming Italians and Rose had nipped to the loo. It was a soft hand to the small of your back. It was her voice, rough and low and too close to your ear.

“This is amazing,” she’d said.

There’d been too much wine – coupled with celebratory champagne – for you to not relax into her touch. And so you’d turned, let your eyes sweep over her before saying, “You _look_ amazing.”

She’d stepped back then, head bowed as if examining for herself the state of her dress. “Oh, I got a bit carried away, I think.” When she’d looked back to you, her cheeks appeared a shade darker. “We haven’t been out like this in ages.”

You couldn’t be trusted to avoid saying something horribly inappropriate, not with Emily looking the way she did, and certainly not while intoxicated. So you’d simply clamped your lips together, reached for your wine glass from the bar and clinked it against Emily’s.

“To you then, and the rebirth of your social life.”

Her laugh was like a pleasant prickling of needles behind your ears. But she’d conceded with a nod before adding, “And to you, for all your success.”

They ricocheted around your head like an echo, just two of countless words you didn’t dare say out loud. _‘To us.’_

Effy grins wickedly while throwing you the pack and the matches, like she’s read all your thoughts and enjoys what she’s seen. She leans back against her pillows as her eyes fall closed and smokes like a movie star.

**

Your stay in London is ticking away so that when your phone rings in the middle of the day – one afternoon, a few days after the opening, when you’d adjusted again to the quiet – it feels like a time bomb detonating.

The call, you’ve almost been expecting; the context comes like a fucking left hook.

Her voice, frantic and nearly unrecognisable, is drowned out almost entirely by the sound of an infant crying – no, _wailing_. Lewis’ cries sound torturous – like someone’s held his tiny, new-born feet against  hot iron.

“Hi – hi, I’m sorry,” are the words you can make out through the receiver, pressing it harder to your ear even though it raises the decibel of baby screams noticeably. “Can you – I mean, did I catch you at a bad time?”

“Emily, what the fuck is going on – are you, is Lewis okay?”

“I can’t get him to stop – I just, fuck, I don’t know what to do.”

You’re moving about the room then, just to feel productive by _movement_ because it’s better than reclining in the hotel bed, listening to Emily completely lose her shit.

The pacing seems to help then, because you remember to ask, “Where’s Rose?”

“Work. Uni. I mean, she went back to work this week, and she’s got classes all day. And yesterday was fine, but today – the nanny’s not answering and Rose's mum is out of town, and I just, I don’t know what to do, Naomi.”

You hear it then, the way Emily’s sobs fall into her son’s, overpowered by his impressive, fucking lung capacity, but distinct all the same.

“Yeah, alright – Emily, it’s alright. You need to calm down, yeah?”

“Can you just –“

And you’re already grabbing your bag, shoving your one free arm into a cardigan and looking for your shoes when you cut in, “Yeah, I’m on my way.”

Emily tells you not to knock – on the off-chance she’s gotten Lewis to settle, or, though it’s unlikely, to _sleep_ , in the time it’ll take you to get there. For a moment, your hand lingers near the door handle, poised to push it open. The hesitation is something familiar – a feeling that’s continued to surface since seeing her that first afternoon, only to be pushed away every time. Squelching every warning sign, no matter how persistent. Emily keeps asking for things, and you can’t help but notice the requests are growing in size. It’s no longer dinners and market shops, fairly innocent in nature. She’s been asking for more – for parts of you that feel less innocent. And you wonder when the request will become too massive for you to carry out. You wonder, with some spark of familiar anxiety, if Emily will ever be able to ask too much of you.

The screaming from inside the flat breaks through your thoughts, so you blink hard and push open the door. In the sitting room, Emily’s pacing, cradling this terribly disruptive creature in her arms. She doesn’t stop moving once she sees you, just pauses mid step and starts bouncing in one spot, shaking her head and clamping down hard on her lips.

And then you’re walking to her – a fucking magnetic draw or something because you’ve got no real idea what to do once you’ve reached her. Assessing her in close contact is worse than you’d anticipated. Tired, watery eyes. Mussed hair that’s probably not been washed. Wrinkled sleep clothes, damp with spit and baby sick.

“Um, here,” you say, holding out your hands to her. And you’ve not actually held a baby in years. Let alone an unhappy one, screaming for his life. Let alone _Lewis_ , who already mirrors Rose so eerily you almost balk and look away.

But Emily must be in a greater state of desperation than you’d originally thought because she hands him over readily. And then he’s in your clutches – his tiny, balled fists, his red, angry face, and his impressively cavernous mouth.

“Hey, whoa – alright then. Alright,” you say to Lewis, sort of starting your own bouncing rhythm, like some reflex you never knew you had. You then look to Emily and ask cautiously, “I assume you’ve tried to bottle him?”

Emily sighs and runs both hands through her hair, pulling it away from her face. “He won’t take more than a few pulls.”

“Right. Nappy?”

“Dry as a bone – I’ve checked probably sixteen times in the past thirty minutes.”

You offer a smile, try for some levity. “Nothing wrong with being thorough, yeah?”

She returns it with a smile of her own, though it’s small and tired and only makes her eyes look more dismal somehow. “His temp’s normal too – I mean, he feels warm,” she says, placing a hand to Lewis’ forehead. “But, I think it’s from all the crying.”

“How long has he been at it? And how the _fuck_ has he not lost steam yet?”

Emily’s hand falls back to her hip as her head tips back, and she speaks towards the ceiling. “I’ve lost track – an hour? I don’t know,” she sighs, runs her hands over her face and through her hair and you watch her for a moment longer than you should before Lewis screams out again.

“Right. I’m just going to walk around a bit,” you say, bouncing him in your arms, this thing that weighs less than your luggage. And then tell her, “You should sit – try to calm down, okay? I think they can sense when you’re, you know, worked up.”

Did you read that somewhere? Or is it just wasted words of wisdom from your mum? Maybe some odd, lingering fact you’ve retained from when there were always stray babies with waifs for mothers passing through your house. It doesn’t much matter if there’s any truth to it because Emily will likely believe _anything_ at this point, and slumps into the sofa on command.

You walk and bounce. Walk and bounce. Turning corners into rooms and down corridors, with no regard for privacy or decorum – telling yourself that Emily’s urgent plea for help has excused all of that. And Lewis doesn’t calm, not immediately, but his volume has lessened by the time you reach the master bedroom. It’s not even closed off, like it might be during a gathering – a dinner party, perhaps. So you just waltz in. Quite literally gliding along, taking long strides into the room because Lewis seems to appreciate the kind of rhythm your long legs afford.

Everything in it is fairly typical – nothing standing out the way you’d expected to walk in and think, _‘Oh yes, Emily sleeps here.’_ You’re not even sure what to make of it, the ordinary décor and impossibly drab furnishings. And it’s almost disappointing – the lack of anything definitively _Emily_ – until you remember it’s the space she shares with someone else. And then it’s rather gratifying, your boredom with the wall colour, the poorly selected prints, and the predictable bedclothes. Which is when you realise you’re able to consider them at all, in the _quiet_ of the room. You take an incredibly slow spin until the reflection in the mirror above the dressing table is your back, then turn your head to see Lewis  against your shoulder, eyes closed.

“Shit,” you say without thinking. And then cringe at the sound of your voice, fearful that the vibrations of it along your shoulder might be enough to wake him. He lies still for several more seconds as you watch him through the mirror. Once you pad lightly out of the room and back down the corridor, Emily’s waiting at the doorway to the sitting room, probably having just registered the silence herself. Her disbelief is so obvious, you want to be offended; but you’re also incredibly, fucking full of yourself at the moment in light of your accomplishment.

“Oh my _god_ ,” she half-mouths, half-whispers.

“Yeah, I know. Not bad for a novice, hey?”

“I could kill you, you know,” she says, her smile a bit less pathetic now that a peaceful quiet is filling up the flat. “If you hadn’t also just saved my fucking sanity.”

She’s crept over to your side, the shoulder where Lewis is asleep, and places a hand on your arm, just below where his tiny fingers hang limp. You let her stay like this – like whatever closeness this is, this comfort you’re sharing by just being in proximity with each other, is allowable for now. Like it’s okay somehow, because of the sleeping baby.

“You should sleep.” She looks up at you, after you’ve already looked back to Lewis’ head. “While he sleeps, you know, get some sleep yourself.”

“Naomi, I couldn’t –“

“You look like shit, Ems.” It’s easier to look at her then, once you’ve insulted her.

“Thanks.”

“I’m just saying, you’d be surprised what a couple of hours can do for you. I imagine with this fucking siren in your room, you’ve not gotten proper sleep in a while, yeah?”

“Right, well, I’m going to make you some tea,” she says before walking away.

“No, Emily,” you call out, a warning tone to your voice that sounds almost haunting. Like hearing a younger version of yourself on video, and barely recognising the pitch of it as your own.   

Emily turns to look at you, partway to the kitchen, expressionless for a full seven seconds. _This is what happens_ , you think. This is how terrible things unfold when lines are blurred. When you can't remember contexts or boundaries, what's mine and what's yours. When time doesn't just slip away but is erased completely. When Emily looks at you, and you know she’s seen the ghost of someone you once were – someone you can’t possibly be anymore – and it’s terrified her.  

But then her face breaks into a defiant smile, pulling you both back to the present. “I’m making you tea, alright? And then I’ll lie down for a bit.”

You’ve somehow manoeuvred your way onto the sofa and shifted Lewis so that he’s more-or-less cradled into the nook of your elbow, along your stomach. And you’re not really able to lean forward to pick up your tea from the coffee table so it’s just been sat there, cooling, until Emily notices you eyeing it and sits up to hand it to you.

“Thanks,” you smile when you’ve had your first sip.

“Are you sure I can’t take him?” she asks, not settling back into her corner of the sofa as _you thought_ had been silently agreed upon as a safe distance between you, but crouches closer on the middle cushion instead.

“You’re meant to be _sleeping_ – besides, if we jostle him and he wakes, all my hard work will be in vain.”

She reaches over for your cup once you’ve taken another sip, sets it back on the table, then rests her head against the back sofa cushions. “Fair enough.”

None of it’s fair. Not the way you’re sat here, caring for Emily and her family. Not your impending flight back to New York. Not the way Emily’s face is still so achingly beautiful on very little sleep.

“Of all the things I thought I’d never witness.” Emily’s got this kind of musing, far-off look in her eyes that fades when she catches your eye. “Sorry.”

“Yeah, well, they’re not all that bad when not screaming for their lives.”

“I just meant –“

“I know what you meant.”

Emily’s quiet again while you frantically rifle through a backlog of possible conversation topics of less importance. Of less historical significance. Topics that are less-likely to make your palms sweat or to make Emily’s eyes look like _that_.

“It wasn’t fair of me to ask for your help.”

“It’s irrelevant, isn’t it? I’ve come, he’s sleeping, you’ve relaxed. Sorted.”

“Still, it can’t have been easy to just –-“

“Emily, can we please just let it go?” She bites at her lower lip when you glare at her a bit insistently. “Sorry, just hand me my tea, will you?”

She does, silently. And then watches while you take another sip.

“Thanks for the tea. It tastes like home.”

“Well, it should. I only ever buy the one brand.”

Her face looks brighter when you hand her the cup, and your pulse starts to regulate itself further away from blind panic. “Glad to see your morals haven’t changed then. Gina would be proud.”

“She practically threatened us within an inch of our lives when we turned up with the wrong kind!” Emily laughs a bit, leans her head back against the cushions and tucks loose hair behind her ear. “I think I'm scarred for life – thinking she’ll pop out from another aisle and catch me buying a different brand.”

“She’s certainly got her quirks.”

“What about the rally she organised in the kitchen, unannounced?”

You throw your head back. “Oh, were you under the impression than _any_ of them were pre-planned?”

“I was nearly starkers in the lounge, with a blinding hangover, because _someone_ ran off to bed on her own in the middle of the night.”

“Oh _that_ rally.” You laugh harder then, trying to keep quiet for the sake of Lewis, but the memory is too vivid, too fond for you to control it very well.

“Yes.” Emily gives you a pointed look. “ _That_ rally.”

Your laughter’s dying out until you remember, “What did that woman say to you again?”

You then look at one another, and with horribly inaccurate Russian accents, recite in unison, “Breasts like those should be photographed, dear girl.”

It takes no more than a few seconds for you to fall apart completely, Emily burying her laughter into the crook of her arm and you covering your mouth with the back of your hand. When you’ve more or less settled, she watches you, her smile looking like some lovely residual of all that laughter.

“Why did you –-“ Emily stops, and you think it’s because she’s held her breath.

“What?”

She looks towards the wall opposite, biting her lip. Then says, “Why did you come?”

“You mean other than because you sounded like the victim in a slasher film?”

She turns back to you, her smile understated. “Yeah.”

You breathe in just once and out through your nose, not letting your eyes leave hers. And then with a shrug, “Because you asked.”

It’s too quiet then. And Emily’s still sat too closely, the way you can hear her breaths are faster and can see her throat works to swallow. But then she sighs and looks away, the moment broken.

“It’s far too easy, isn’t it?”

You try to read her expression for quick seconds, studying different features that used to be like tells: the flicker of her left eyebrow; the curve in the corners of her mouth; or the darting patterns of her eyes. All the while feeling your heart rate quicken the longer you look at her.

“With you, I mean,” Emily clarifies, then starts to push back – her feet flat against your thigh because it’s not like her sofa is huge or anything – and readjusts until she’s laid down again. “It’s far too easy with you.”

You’re trying to heed your own advice – to keep fucking _calm_ – because if there’s any truth to it, then the way your pulse is hammering away will have Lewis awake in no time.

But then you ask, like a sodding masochist, “What do you mean?” It’s the absolute _last_ thing either of you need right now, for Emily – sleep-deprived and feeling nostalgic – to keep talking.

She curls onto her side then, reaches up for a throw on the back of the sofa and pulls it over herself. You wait and watch for her to wrap a corner around her hands and tuck them beneath her chin. When she does, you bite hard on the skin inside your cheek.

“Falling into old habits.” Her eyes droop, and she yawns, but she looks at you like she means it. Like she’s checking to be sure you’ve heard it. And she may as well have shouted it through a fucking bullhorn for how much your ears are currently ringing.

Emily finally sleeps. You shift a bit at some point just so that your back doesn’t cramp into knots and end up disturbing Lewis’ nap. For one, extremely tense moment he looks at you with these incredibly captivating eyes – hazel, like his mother’s – and you hold your breath until he closes them again, his arms flopping back onto his stomach.

You watch the clock and listen to the sound of Emily breathing. You wonder, among other things, how long you should let Emily sleep. Considering that if you don’t _physically_ wake her, she will likely sleep for several consecutive days.

You wonder how long babies at six weeks will sleep. And, more pressing, that if upon waking they are as demonically-charged as they are prior to.

You then wonder at what point a Uni professor – such as Rose – might return home from work. Because, it’s not wrong, what you’re doing. Not explicitly. But then, it must be something – it’s certainly not _nothing_ since you can’t shirk a feeling of ill-at-ease at the idea of Rose coming home and finding you in her place.

When it’s gone about an hour, another thought strikes you, and this one being far lighter than the rest, you decide to act on it. So very carefully, you reach into your back pocket, retrieving your mobile. It takes a few tries but in the end, you’ve captured the photo of Lewis in your lap and have to bite back laughter as it’s sent off. You’re back to watching the clock and before a full minute passes, you feel the tickling buzz of a new text message.

Classically, even Effy’s written replies sound bored and detached.

_The fuck?_

Your thumb moves to reply even as Emily shifts a bit on the sofa.

_At Ems – fill you in later at yours?_

She first responds helpfully: _Will clear stock from several off-licence in prep_

Then, in true form: _Tell, Ems, I said hello_

It’s a relief that Emily stirs awake on her own because you hadn’t really formulated a great plan for doing it yourself – one that didn’t involve _touching_ her, at least, which is something you're now actively trying to avoid doing.

And she’s only slept for maybe an hour-and-a-half, so you don’t expect that her voice will scratch out the way it does. But, of course, you’re not that fortunate, and so the sound of it hits your chest like a brick.  

“Hi.” She’s not gotten more profound upon waking then, in so many years, but that’s hardly the fucking point. Because _what_ she says has always paled so heavily in comparison to the _way_ she says it.

“You slept.” you say, pathetically observant.

“Yeah – how long?” She’s stretching, rubbing at one eye and trying to find the clock on the wall opposite.

“Over an hour.”

“Oh. He should eat then,” she says, running her hands through her hair and sitting up.

It’s the first thing you think when she’s sat next to you again, legs criss-crossed, and checking in on Lewis. So you tell her, “You look better – less tired, and less –“

“Like shit?” she finishes with a smirk.

You look at her – take in everything that you can, everything that you _shouldn’t_ – because these moments are fleeting. Your time is nearly up, and though you’ve no real idea how you’re meant to go without seeing her again, it changes nothing.

“Definitely,” you say, so softly she’d have to be completely oblivious not to register its implications.

She won’t hold your eye for more than a beat, and looks back to Lewis as one of his feet twitches. “I’ll get his bottle ready if you don’t mind sitting with him for another few minutes.”

The sarcasm that usually fuels your responses is nowhere to be found and instead you’re just saying, “Sure,” and watching her exit into the kitchen.

You’ve passed him over to Emily without much fuss – he seems less likely to shatter glass anyway – and then just sit watching them. It’s not fair to say you’re watching _her_ , because it’s the pair of them that’s got you entranced. It’s just this lovely image you’ll likely never forget because it’s the sweetest memories of Emily that you carry about. 

“So, this is it then?”

You’re sat back on the sofa, on the side where she slept, while Emily holds Lewis in an over-stuffed arm chair near the window. The room has been quiet for several minutes, just the suckling sounds of a baby feeding, the hum of the fridge.

When she looks at you without saying anything, you know you’ve said it out loud – this thought that’s been cramping your head all afternoon. She must know there’s more to it, but she won’t even ask what it is you’re trying to say because just a _look_ from Emily has always been enough to get you talking.

You can feel an honest response forming, threatening its way into open air. It sounds like your greatest fear being spoken aloud. _‘This is the life we were meant to have – the one I left behind.’_

But then Emily’s still watching with expectancy, and you know you’ve not yet answered. So you clear your throat and tell her, “Time’s up.”

You’ve just heard the front door unlatch, followed by the shuffling of bags and clicking of heels.

“We’re in here,” Emily calls out, her eyes not leaving yours, but in seconds you’re met with Rose’s hazel eyes and warm smile as she appears in the doorway.

“Hello,” you say, standing from the sofa.

“Ah, the cavalry,” she sighs, squeezing lightly to your upper arm and smiling back to Emily.

“Just dumb luck, I think,” you say, brushing off her compliment.

"Nonsense. You were brilliant," Emily counters.

Rose moves towards Emily and kisses her forehead. You watch Emily close her eyes at the contact just before you do the same, taking a steadying breath.

“So, I’ll just be off then,” you’re saying, stepping back at least three paces towards the doorway before Rose turns to you.

“I’ll walk you out.”

Emily then says, “Thank you for your help, Naomi. I couldn’t have done it -–“

“You’ll learn,” you tell her quickly, before she can finish. Because it’s what you don’t want to hear from her. That she can’t do without you. Because, so clearly, she has.

At the front door, you’re slipping back into your shoes, and Rose reaches for the door handle then stops to watch you. It’s so unnerving, it takes three bloody attempts to get your right heel into the ratty trainers you refuse to tie and untie.

“It’s odd,” she starts, and it lingers there – her thought – while you try to shake the feeling of being strangled. “I hadn’t pegged you as someone who harbours regrets.”

It’d be such a conniving thing to say if it were anyone else who’d said it. Like some smarmy antagonist in a teen drama on BBC3. But Rose looks and sounds like the least contemptuous person you’ve ever met, save Emily perhaps. And even Emily has her dark side. Rose just honestly looks contemplative as she says it and looks to you with a meek smile.

In another three days you’ll be gone. You’ll be back to a life you’ve created without all this – without _Emily_. And even as you think it, you look back towards the sitting room and smile. It’s a sad smile and not even one that you mind Rose observing because you quite like her. And you think, in spite of everything, it’d be so fucked to try and pull one over on her.

So you look back to meet her kind eyes and tell her, “Just the one.”

**

Effy takes the piss the second your foot is in the door. And, actually, there’s an odd comfort in that.

“How’d you like a whiskey sour, _mummy_?”

“Fuck off, Eff.”

“What about a wine spritzer then?”

Her elbows are leant against the breakfast counter, chin held innocently in her hands when you sling your bag onto a stool and flip her off.

“Vodka then?”

“In buckets,” you say, slumping into a seat at the counter. You’re sat across from her then, her eyes bright and reflecting – like amusement shadowed by intrigue.

Effy was never short on mood-altering substances, and though she’s clearly changed – matured alongside you and discovered clothing that covers a bit more of her arse – you’re exceptionally grateful that, as she produces a joint and a bottle of vodka, that part of her hasn’t been lost in the process.

“So, you’re in love with her,” she poses at some point later. It’s neither a question nor statement of fact and somehow both at the same time.    

She’s got an outdoor terrace that puts Emily’s to shame, and you’ve been out there, enjoying the warmth and the waning sun and the city view, for hours. You pause, a lit match partway to the tip of your fag, and look up to meet her eyes – even their colour feels invasive, unrelenting.

It’s a handful of seconds later, once you’ve finished the task at hand, inhaling a long drag and then breathe out long and slow. There’s never been any rush with Effy – never a real hurry to either engage or respond. So you sit with it, letting the words bounce about inside your head. You try making it sound less accusatory. You try pushing away images of Emily from earlier – looking too lovely or too contented or too afraid to hear the truth. But the images are now like stains on white cloth – though a concerted effort will make them fade, a memory of them will always linger.

When half your cigarette is gone, you finally say, “I can’t be.” It could be something you’ve said in a quiet room all by yourself, for how little it matters that Effy’s there to hear it.

“The thing is,” Effy says in a lighter tone, smirking as she pulls a long drag off her own fag, “you’re both fucked at any point that you’re not with each other.”

“Cheers,” you smile, exhaling a plume of smoke that swirls with hers. “That’s well comforting.”

Effy shrugs, leaning back into the slope of her lounge chair. You look at her, and for a moment have to wonder if she knows how infuriating it is to be mates with someone who can be so unapologetically brazen.

“And, anyway,” you continue. “That’s not even true.” Effy’s head lolls to one side so she’s facing you. And by her blank expression you think she’s either already bored or incredibly stoned. “Emily has Rose and Lewis and her education. Her entire life’s basically a raving _success_ – since this is apparently everything she’s wanted since we were sixteen. So I’d say she’s pretty far from fucked.” You’re feeling pretty vindicated, having delivered such a strong argument to rebuff Effy’s shit theory on your life without Emily. Or hers apart from you. But then, you’ve clearly forgotten the type of stamina a drunken debate with Effy Stonem requires.

“You’re shit at lying, Naomi. Even when it’s to yourself.”

You sit up, your posture defensive. “I’m not –“

“Emily’s got this life – the wife, the kid, the bloody _snooze_ of a flat – by way of circumstance. And, I’ve no doubt she’s found love and happiness in all that because she’s not like me and she’s not like you. She can’t just tread water in misery. It’d fucking drown her.” You furrow your brow at her, but your shoulders start to slack – the fight gone right out of you. “So she’s taken these bits and pieces – some shit replacements of what she had – and she’s fashioned a raft to stay afloat.”

She stands up then, taking your drink that’s gone empty when you weren’t paying attention. You’re about the same height – you and Effy – except you’ve got to crane your neck just to look up at her while she towers over you from this angle.

"And, what -- she's just going to abandon all that simply because I've turned up?"

Effy's smile is placating and yet not unkind. "It's not terribly likely, but that doesn't change the fact that all these _things_ , they’re just filling the gaps. Just taking up space in her life like fucking placeholders. Because you and I both know, the only thing Emily Fitch has ever wanted since she was sixteen, is you.”

**

It’s the following evening when you’re sat in the hotel bed, leant up against every pillow provided on the king size [plus two others you’d requested from the concierge], and updating your schedule for your return to New York. _Home_ , you remind yourself, your return _home_. You’ve got the laptop propped on your legs, a tablet on the bed beside you, and use your thumb to scroll through your mobile. _Naive_ , you think, that you’d ever considered your mum to be the cliché.

Your flight leaves Heathrow on Sunday, and by Monday you’ll be back to it – back to a routine that doesn’t include Effy or London. Or, more importantly, _Emily_ , a girl who’s significance you’ve gradually been trying to lessen for the past ten years.

There are text messages that you’ll delete [eventually] and sensory memories of this trip – of _her_ – that are bound to fade. Even though every touch, every look, every laugh is crystal clear at the moment, you know it’s true: that the potency of them all will lessen over time. And it’s how you’ll survive it. Because you’ve done it once before – learnt to be without her – and survival is something learnt, you think. Fuck instinct. Fuck the fittest and the evolution of its survival. Nothing about the past decade feels innate. It feels like something in which you’ve been trained. Something in which you’ve had to teach yourself. Like relearning to use a limb that’s undergone major surgery.

You’re scrolling her texts, absently, when the phone next to the bed goes. And at first you just look at it because in well over four weeks it’s never rang. Because it’s not as if the front desk is terribly nagging, and you’ve not given out your room number to anyone other than Effy, who’s texted you all six times she’s been by while on the lift, having already forgotten it.

“Hello?”

“Good evening, Ms Campbell. We apologise for any disturbance,” the woman, who you presume represents the hotel’s front desk, tells you. 

“No, uh, no disturbance. No problem.”

“There’s a woman here at the desk asking for you – a Ms Fitch?”

 _Fucking Christ_. Your eyes fall closed and then reopen in confusion.

“Oh. Alright,” you’re answering, flicking through screens on your mobile, because surely you’ve missed a message of some sort before Emily would resort to just showing up and ringing you via the fucking concierge. “I’ll be right down then,” you say, having found fuck-all from her in your phone. 

“Would you like me to send her up, Ms Campbell? She says she doesn’t want to trouble you.”

“Fucking rich that,” you mumble, swinging your legs off the bed.

“I’m sorry?”

“Nothing – yeah, uh, send her up. Thanks.”

You’ve got a few, useless minutes to assess your clothes and the state of your room before hearing a soft knock on your door. Upon opening it, your stomach drops out entirely, leaving nothing but a hollow sensation that makes you want to toss.

“Jesus _Christ_!”

Emily’s pitiful smile barely appears before it’s gone again. Her make-up smudged in dark lines down her face, she manages a small, “Hi.”

“ _Jesus Christ_ , Emily!” You’re sort of whisper-yelling, not wanting to cause a scene while, at the same time, not really having control over your own voice. “What the – what the _fuck_?”

She shifts uneasily from foot to foot, and then tries to explain. “It’s not as bad as it looks – I mean, it doesn’t –-“ But then she can’t say any more before crumbling in front of you. Shaky chin and wracked sobs – a perfect replica of the girl you once reduced to this very thing some hundred years ago.

You guide her into the room then, a touch that’s barely there on the top of her shoulder, as her hand in a loose fist rests just below her cheek bone, the one that’s split.

It’s reddened and coloured with short smears of dried blood where Emily’s tried to clean it up with her sleeve.

“What the _fuck_ happened? Where is Rose? I mean, we’ve got to fucking ring her, yeah? She’ll come get you.” You nod to yourself, walking ahead of Emily into the room, then turn back to her. “Where were you – someone got to you on the street or something? The Tube? Did they take anything? Your phone? Fuck, Ems, your face.”

You stand stock still for a moment before bringing a hand to your forehead and starting to pace. You've always heard that going into shock either leads to stoicism or makes you prattle like a manic arsehole. And, well, you never were one to keep your mouth shut.

"Seriously, can we phone Rose? Or should we get you to a hospital? She could meet us there, I suppose."

“Naomi.” It’s more of a whimper, the way she says your name, though it shuts you up effectively. Emily sits on the bed, just the edge. The very spot where you’d been sat minutes earlier. “I didn’t lose my phone." Her gaze is to the floor, some fixed point near her shoes. "I’m sorry I didn’t – I shouldn’t have just showed up like this.”

“Emily, it’s fine. But, can you _please_ just tell me what's happened?”

Her lips are pinched firmly together until she looks up and says, “It’s sort of my fault, really.”

You’re just staring at her like she’s gone mental. Like _you’ve_ gone mental and conjured up this entire illusion of Emily, sat before you. “What are you talking about?”

She attempts a smile that turns your stomach and points to the mark on her face. There's this quick inhalation, like she warding off another sob, and then she says, “It's the ring I’d given her that did the most damage, I think.”

Your field of vision starts to narrow so that the room feels like it’s gone gradually darker, peripherally. And you think it’s what happens right before passing out. So you sit beside her on the bed when it feels like your knees might give out at any moment. A cold sweat trickles over your skin as you try to swallow.

“What?” It’s hardly a question, the word itself barely audible.

Though she’s not actively crying, Emily’s eyes brim heavy with tears that spill out as she blinks and clamps her lips tightly together.

“Emily. Did Rose –-“

“ _Please_ , Naomi. I can’t.”

“Can’t _what_ , Em?” You’ve found your voice again, though it’s frantic and bordering on shrill when you know Emily’s likely hoped for you to remain calm.

“Can you please just not ask? I don't think I can say any more about it.”

There’s a silence in the room that you can hear – one that’s so still, it’s nearly deafening. It sounds like this for long minutes, this invasive quiet crowding the room, where you’re both just sat at slight angles on the mattress edge, your knees barely touching.

When you think your pulse might have slowed, even minutely, you hope it's also calmed your voice enough to ask, "Does it hurt?"

Emily just shakes her head, keeps pinching her top lip against the bottom over and over. 

“I think you should put some ice on it.”

She doesn’t move to respond, but your eyes fall to her hand that’s resting on her knee, and your heart shatters to see it tremor beyond her control. An instinct urges you to take her fingers, to squeeze them together between your own. To take the fear from them and smother it. Though it’s still so unclear what role you’re being asked to play -- what Emily's actually asking of you by turning up. And so the urge to comfort her, to hold her, to wrap her up in an embrace that feels long overdue, is quickly silenced by something louder that sounds like: _‘Not yet.’_

When you’ve fetched the ice pail off the desk, you turn to see Emily’s tears have dried in messy streaks of faded black and red. She’s still perched on the edge of the bed, like at any minute she could take flight and be gone.

“Why here?”

She looks up and when you shrug, as if to reiterate the question, her shoulders tense.

Emily’s mouth falls open to respond just as you panic, realising you can’t possibly hear an answer. “Forget it.” You hold up the small pail and try for a quick smile. “I’ll just be a tick.”

Out in the corridor, you take several deep breaths, pressing a palm to your forehead like checking for fever. You drop the pail, letting it clang uncerimoniously to the floor, and reach for your mobile.

“Pick up, pick up, pick up,” you chant, until Effy does, at which point you wait barely a breath before saying, “How fast can you get here?”

“Aw, miss me?”

“Also, bring drugs – not like hallucinogens or fucking speed or anything but, like, pills. For pain. You’ve got those, right?”

“Naomi, are you alright?” It’s about as concerned a tone you’ve ever heard from her.

And you’re clearly _not_ alright, for obvious reasons. But then you stop pacing up and down the corridor and lean your shoulder against the wall because your chest is tightening a bit, and yeah, this is probably what a full-blown panic attack feels like. 

It’s a struggle, and thank fuck that lengthy explanations have, to Effy, always seemed superfluous since you can’t manage more than, “It’s Emily.”

When Effy gets to the room, she approaches Emily silently, her movements soft and fluid as she walks toward the bed. She gently cups Emily’s face and tilts it up just so. Emily’s hand falls to her lap, the one that’s been holding the towel-wrapped ice in place, and then Effy’s thumb slides softly on the skin just below the cut. Emily watches Effy for a reaction – her eyes just darting back and forth while Effy assesses for permanent damage or something; and, you just watch her, Emily, and chew helplessly on your bottom lip.

After a second or two Effy just says, “Take a couple of these.”

“What are they?” Emily asks once Effy’s deposited two, small white pills into her palm. “They’re not going to, like –-“

“Fuck you up?” Effy finishes with a slight curve to her lips. “It’s not Gobbler’s End, is it?” And Emily, miraculously, smiles a bit at that. “They’re just for the pain. I wouldn’t make plans to operate heavy machinery within the next few hours, but they’ll mostly just help you sleep.”

Emily stares at the pills in her hand. “Oh, well I shouldn’t –-“

“Yeah, Eff, I don’t know.”

You’ve chimed in only _after_ realising you’re not sure what else to say. You’re not sure how to tell Emily she can fuck off with her drowsy pain meds since the idea of her sleeping in your hotel room is making your skin crawl. Just as you’re not sure how to tell her you’d actually like it if she stayed, if she slept and woke up and stayed a bit longer. You can’t tell her either without telling her more than you should. Without telling her _everything_.

Effy just looks between the both of you like she couldn’t be more amused if she tried, and says, “Sorry, was that not the plan? For you to lie down for a bit and rest?” She looks to Emily, who’s mouth is still just gaping open by a small amount, afraid to answer. When Effy turns to you, she smiles in a way that is so reminiscent of the cunt she was at seventeen to boys like Cook and Freddie, you almost recoil. “Naomi was a bit _unclear_ on the specifics.”

Your response is flat, measured. “It’s fine.”

Effy, you’ll deal with later. When there are less witnesses.

“No, I really should go.” Emily moves to stand, but Effy’s fully blocking her from where she’s stood beside the bed.

“No.” Your tone is firm as is your expression, though you’ve not felt this uncertain in lifetimes. "You'll stay."  

Emily looks over at you – sort of frozen partway between standing and sitting – and her eyes do this thing where she asks two questions at once. One aloud, as she says, “Are you sure?” And the second, you can hear only because you’re looking right at her.

“No,” you shrug. “But, that’s never stopped me before.” 

**

You’re stood with Effy in the corridor just outside your room, having an argument in these ridiculously emotive whispers, strained for how you’re attempting to fight with her without raising your voice.

“What exactly is your plan? Storm the castle?”

“I don’t _know_! But, I’m not just going to fucking _sit_ here and do nothing.”

“Christ, Naomi,” Effy’s head tips back against the wall at her back. It’s an exasperation reserved for when you’re being an oblivious twat, and unfortunately, a tone you know far too well. “You being here with her is clearly the _opposite_ of doing nothing.”

“Well it doesn’t fucking feel like it.” You cross your arms, high over your chest, and look off down the corridor to keep from having to look at Effy.

She props a foot against the wall behind her, which catches your attention. It looks incomplete, her stance, because of the way her fingers dangle at her side, you expect to see a lit fag between them. You'd kill for a cigarette, actually, if it didn't involve bumming one from Effy. 

“And what would you like to do – drag Rose behind the rubbish bins and have a go at her face?”

“ _No_ ,” your eyes cut angrily back to her, “of fucking course not. I just want –-“

“What _do_ you want, Naomi?” The coursing anger is making your breaths heavier. Your chest rises and falls noticeably as you watch Effy. Her face insolent, daring you to be honest. “What is it that you _want_ exactly?”

The question is so heavily loaded, you can actually feel the weight of it, hanging off of you like wet clothes. And you just stand there defensively, across from Effy, like two opponents in some ridiculous American western.  

There’s no use delaying your surrender. Effy can’t help it that she always wins. And so you let your shoulders slump, shrugging them helplessly. “I leave in two days, Eff.” The truth – or at least some of it – quickly follows. “I just want to know she’ll be alright.”

Effy watches you for a few seconds longer then pushes herself off the wall and takes a step towards you.

“Go get her mobile.”

“What the fuck for?”

Her only response is to slightly raise one eyebrow.

“You think I can just go in there and demand her phone with no explanation?”

“It’s on the bedside table. And, if her lack of tolerance for prescription pills in sixth form is any indication, there’s a good chance she’s already passed out. So, no, I don’t suspect you’ll need to _explain_ anything.”

Partly, you're grateful to find Emily actually is asleep, rolled onto her side and facing away from the door as you approach. Partly, you find it fucking irritating that Effy is still right about _everything_.

You let the door click shut very slowly behind you then walk the few paces towards Effy, who’s waiting with her hand out for Emily’s mobile. She navigates the screens with mild disinterest and the confidence of a trained criminal while you stand there, nervously biting into your thumbnail.

When she puts the phone to her ear, Effy’s face remains neutral for a pause then breaks into something wickedly amused when she says, “Katie fucking Fitch.”

**

There’s a reading chair in your room that you’ve angled towards the bed, opposite the side where Emily’s sleeping so you can watch her. You sit there, contemplating the potency of the drugs Effy provided, the weather in New York, the unrecognisable ticks and thumps of the hotel. Your thoughts drift in and out, all of them failing to distract from visions of Emily being roughed up – pushed or slapped about in a hundred miserable scenarios – by one of the least violent people you’ve ever met. Nothing about it makes any kind of sense, and eventually, after giving yourself a fucking migraine, exhaustion overtakes you.

When you wake, you can’t pick up your head without wincing because it’s fallen at this horrible angle; and the bottoms of your feet start to tingle where they’ve lost circulation from the awkward positioning of sleeping in a fucking reading chair. Squinting, rubbing at your eyes, and feeling like basic shit, you pull your mobile off the desk beside you and check the time. Somewhat hesitantly, you then check Emily’s phone which has, for hours, been silently filling up with missed calls and countless messages. All from Rose. 

It must be near dawn, the way the blackened night sky is fading to pale greys that drape over the room. You get up to stretch, finding that your movements – however subtle and quiet – have stirred Emily from sleep.

Her eyes seem unfocused, confused at the bed linens and other surroundings, until she sees you standing across the dimly lit room.

Her head still laid on the pillow, she watches you for what feels like too long. And finally asks, “What time is it?”

“It’s still early – you should maybe sleep more.”

“Where’s Effy?” Her voice is rough, like she's spent all night shouting.

The thought resurfaces images you've created on your own since Emily's kept schtum on any real details. You blink them away, each horrible possibility, and clear your throat. 

“Gone home hours ago.”

Emily shifts in the bed, reaches up to place a few tentative fingers to her face, working her jaw around like its gone stiff. “Did you sleep?” she asks, frowning from the contact against her skin.

“Yeah, a bit.” Since you’ve always had shit timing when it comes to brutal honesty, after a few seconds of silence, you just blurt out, “We rang Katie.”

Emily’s eyes look somewhere between shocked and terrified – either way, it’s rather unnerving – so you look away, clear your throat, and plough on. “She’s getting on a flight to London later this morning.”

She spots her mobile then, on the desk, sat beside your own. “So you drug me and then steal my fucking _phone_?”

“What? _No!_ Emily, come on.”

“Can I have it please?” She’s sat up now, hand outstretched, and anger all over her face.

“Look, I’m sorry but –-“

“Just hand it to me, will you?” She won’t even look at you now, her eyes fixed to the phone when you reach over for it.

“She’s called,” you say quietly. “Loads.” You sigh, handing it over. Emily looks down, starts scrolling through her mobile without responding. “Em, you can’t be angry about Katie.”

“Of course I’m angry,” she snaps, throwing the phone onto the bed. “She’s _my_ sister, she’s _my_ fucking family and you had no right –-“

“No, Emily – _you_ had no right.” You’ve said it then, and there’s no going back. So you take a long, shaky breath and keep at it. “You can’t do this – you can’t keep coming to me, like this.”

“What the fuck does that mean? I already told you, I’m sorry for turning up, but –-“

“It’s not that, Emily. It’s not the fact that you’re here, it’s _why_ you’re here.”

She seems to shrink back a bit then, the anger falling from her face and limbs. 

“You could’ve sought out other friends, you could have rang Katie yourself, or you could have caught a fucking train to Bristol, for that matter. But, you didn’t.” Her eyes have started to fill again with tears, and Emily looks away.

You sit back into the chair across from her, hold your head in your hands while taking deep breaths, and stare at your feet. When you look back up, Emily seems just as likely to fall apart at any minute, so you keep your voice soft. “I don’t know what it means that you came here instead. I don’t even know if _you_ know what it means. But, I’m leaving, Ems. In two fucking days. And, I’m sorry if you think it was out-of-line to ring your sister, but I honestly don’t know what you expected me to do. I’m fucking _leaving_.”  

Emily just nods and looks away, wiping her eyes with her sleeve as they fill with tears.  

“You get that we can’t do this anymore, right?”

“Do what, Naomi?” When Emily catches your eye, there’s something shadowing her expression. Something darker that’d not been there before.

It’s pulsing just below your skin then, the anticipation of a conversation that’s been brimming for weeks, and this is it. You’re at the brink of it. Finally. “This – whatever the fuck _this_ is.” Your hand moves to gesture between the two of you.

“I thought we were just – we’re friends, aren’t we?” Emily’s voice is unsteady too, the way it sounds caught near the back of her throat.

“But, we’re not, Emily. We weren’t ever _just_ anything.”

She only manages to speak between wracked sobs, but the momentum is too much now. Too hard and fast to stop its inevitable crash-and-burn. “But, we can be, can't we?

"Emily ..."

"Why? Why can’t we just –-“

“Because I’ll always think she’s not enough – I’ll always think I loved you better. I’m never going to _not_ think that, okay? Not with Rose, not with anyone.” It sounds like echoes in an empty space, your words vibrating in your ears. A tear slides halfway down your cheek before you quickly wipe it away against your shoulder. And when you feel your emotions breaking you from inside out, your chest and arms begin to shake. It’s hardly more than a whisper, your final admission. “And, I think you know that.”

Emily cries to herself -- doesn't agree or disagree -- just turns away and pulls her knees up to her chest, hugging her arms around them. Your lip keeps trembling, though you bite it to keep from sobbing. And there’s a stream of tears that keeps regenerating no matter how often you swipe at your eyes. It feels fucking terrible to be sat with her this way, your chest ripped open and exposed. The truth doesn’t set anything free – it carves you out and leaves your heart a vulnerable, thumping mass. 

And you can live with the pain of it – you’ve long since learnt tolerance to this type of infliction. But seeing Emily hurting is something altogether different. Something visceral and unavoidable, particularly when she’s sat right in front of you. 

You move cautiously, from the chair around the foot of the bed, though most of the hesitation you’ve felt since early August is gone as you sit in front of her. You’re close enough so that when you’ve tucked one leg up under the other, it rests on her feet, against her shins.

Emily fights against the tears with words that come stuttering out. “She just – I’ve never seen her like that, _ever_. And, I left – I ran right out of the flat and into the first taxi, and he asked where I was going and –“ she swipes at her eyes as another sob breaks through. “I couldn’t – it was the only place, when he asked – I couldn’t think of anywhere else.”

“Hey,” you shush her. “It’s okay.”

Emily shakes her head with conviction, “It’s not, though. It’s not okay.”

With a surprisingly steady hand you reach up, brush small strands of hair from her face – and Emily remains perfectly still, watching you. The cut has been cleaned, and it doesn't look half as bad as it did. Effy had helped wash up her face and eyes, and she now looks so reminiscent of a girl you once knew, you can't help but say, "It is. For now, it just is, alright?"

When your hand falls back onto the duvet, Emily looks down to it and breathes out. Her fingers are cold and still considerably shaken when they find your own, but they hold on tightly. You look down too, watch as your fingers work their way between hers. And you can actually feel it, the way the heat from your skin seeps into her fingers, warming them by degrees. Until the tremors still, and the temperature regulates, and you can no longer decipher between your own warmth and hers. 

The room has brightened a bit, whatever clouded sun that will cover London skies still slowly making its way over the building tops. Time passes, and you’ve no real idea if it’s been minutes or hours, when Emily finally says, “I should probably go.”

And you just nod and stand, waiting for her to stand up next to you, which she does. "Okay."

The familiar hesitation returns then, and it’s so strong you can actually feel it, like muscle spasms, in your arms and legs. But Emily erases it entirely by leaning in, wrapping her arms around your waist and pulling you into a hug. Your arms fall around her shoulders, and her head leans into your chest, like your bodies are made of notches and grooves that seamlessly slide back into place. 

 


End file.
